what a beautiful night to be outdoors listening to music, and what great music that was to listen to.
got there in time to catch most of blond redhead's set. enjoyed it a lot more than i thought i would, their music sounded great on the big PA. some of their stuff was really trippy. admittedly they only had half my attention most of the time, as i was busy eating, drinking, finding a good spot on the floor, etc.
LCD were in fine form, james murphy seemed to have more love for NYC than the crowd had for him (which was in fact a lot, mind you). they trotted out various members of AF to play along - the butler brothers on "north american scum", regine on "someone", and richard parry on "new york i love you". james' ad libs on that last one were pretty funny. i still preferred their show at the 930 (natch) but this was damn solid. much much better than their coachella performance.
what to say about arcade fire? they deliver. highlight for me was definitely "my body is a cage" - sent shivers up and down my spine. regine played drums for a couple of songs, don't remember ever seeing her do that before. win implied that 25,000 people were at the show, certainly didn't feel like it. he also tossed out that they wouldn't be playing NYC for the next couple of years - i hope i misunderstood this. i had a great spot: dead center, about a third of the way between the stage and soundboard, even got a small boost by standing on the cable-protector thing. sound was really good, great line of sight.
a great night out. a few lame cam-phone pix
here. i'd expect a boot of this show to appear online at some point. if/when it does, please let me know
i ended up driving to randall's, and drove right on out after the show. i feared having to spend an hour getting out of the parking lot, instead i was off the island in less than 5 minutes. a very welcome surprise.
